


The Betrayal

by orphan_account



Category: Pocket Monsters | Pokemon (Video Games)
Genre: Alternate Interpretation, Gen, gender-neutral protagonist
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-17
Updated: 2012-04-16
Packaged: 2017-11-03 19:25:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 15
Words: 17,014
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/385000
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You dare betray Team Rocket?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. the lab

It began simply enough, in the same way that his days always began. It began with a soft walk to the basement of the manor, with the quiet echo of footsteps against metal floors. It began with a human turning the corner into the room, with a human pressing hands against the glass, with a human looking at him with dark, dark eyes.

"I can't stay here for long today," the human said. "I have somewhere I need to go. They want me to do something for them."

He sounded a terse sigh that rode into the human's thoughts, and then he plunged further down into the depths. "It cannot be helped?"

"No. It's kind of stupid, actually. I'd rather stay here."

"What is it about?"

"Something stupid, like I said. Nothing you need to worry about."

Just to make sure, he prodded through the mind, clattered through thoughts - but there was nothing. "I see."

"You do, don't you? Literally." The human smiled almost warmly. "What about you? Anything exciting?"

"Pain."

"Pain? Same thing every day."

"I wonder why you bother asking."

"Yeah, me too."

He hung there, turned around, studied the human. "And you? What sort of pain do you feel, as you live your life?"

A shrug. "I don't feel any pain, really."

"Is that so?" he breathed into that human's mind, "Is that truly so?"

"Yes," came the whisper.

"But you are a human." He threw the words forward, crashed them into that feeble, that _human_ mind. He seared the words against idle thoughts, carved and clawed them inside. "I am not human, and I have felt pain. Pain - pain is all you have ever known. Pain is all your kind has ever taught me. You must feel _something._ "

"No," the human said with a simple shake of the head, as though shaking off the mind's assault, as though nothing had been felt at all. "No, I don't feel much of anything anymore. I just feel tired."

He felt numb for a long time, curling in the warm liquid, staring at the enigma before him. This enigma was more complicated than any puzzle, any maze, any game of chess. It left him unhappy, almost as unhappy as when that very same enigma made some mistake during chess, some wrong calculation that made his victory much too easy.

But this victory wasn't coming easily at all. So he tried again, slowly. "Then why are you here?"

"I wanted to talk to you. See if you were up for a game or something."

"That is not what I was asking. Why are you _here?_ Here, _now?_ "

The human paused, looked away for a moment, mouth opened.

"If there is no pain, no sensation other than exhaustion - then why are you here? Why am I here? What is this...what is all of this for?"

"I don't know how to answer that." The human looked at him in his eyes. "I really, really don't."


	2. the grave

The death had been clean and easy - _smart and efficient,_ like the boss had said. Its skull was cracked, crumpled in - one moment it had been some ferocious, vicious little monster, thrashing everything that they threw at it. And now it was utterly still and quiet. It took one quick, clean movement. Simple enough, but the kid was the only one who could do it.

Something in the sky rumbled for a moment, the fell silent. Now, the executive approached the body, nudged it with his foot, shifted his whip in his hands. "You did all right, kid. Thought the boss was just hyping you up."

"Now you can get all the skulls you want." The kid glanced off to the side at the looming Alakazam, which hung there like a silent marionette. It was the one that did the deed, without any fear, any regret, any concern.

He had never seen anything like it.

"You could even try catching one yourself. Take the mother's bone, and let it carry it around." The kid patted the pokémon. It didn't even move; it just stared ahead, silent, still.

"It takes too much time to raise one up from when it's small. There are easier ways to get more money off of them."

"I think it's worth the effort. Why, just look at me. I'm still young, aren't I? I managed to do something you guys couldn't."

"You're better with pokémon than we are. That's all there is to it. Whatever.” He shrugged. “We're done here."

"That's all? Well, that's not very exciting." The kid seemed to be about to say something more, but the grunt girl cleared her throat, nodded in the direction of the Alakazam. It had lifted its spoons up and was thoughtlessly tugging along the Marowak's corpse, dragging along little streaks of blood that stained the gravetower roof. "Fine, we're done," the kid muttered, calling back the pokémon.

The grunt patted the kid's shoulder and looked down at the body, her expression somewhat unreadable but mostly sad. "Why are you here? Were you expecting us to talk to it, be friends, get along happily? Happy sunshine and rainbows, shit like that?"

"We could at least bury it," she murmured. 

"The townies can bury it in their own time."

"You know those stories, don't you? About ghosts coming back to haunt you—"

" _We're done here,_ " he repeated.

"Just saying..."

He remembered how, just this morning, the kid and that grunt were teasing each other as though they were ordinary people, as though they were real siblings. He remembered how she would poke with remarks like, _“You keep grinning like that, kid, and it'll stick on your face. Yeah, you hear me? You're gonna become some idiot Gengar, you moron!"_ And they would just laugh and laugh, and the grunt would just be a regular girl and the kid would be an actual kid for a moment.

And here they were now in the next moment, standing on the top of a gravetower, with no words between them - just the smell of smoke and singes, just the kid's breathless chuckle and her silent exhaustion.

The sky shuddered for a moment, the city grew a little darker. "Come," the executive said over the rising storm. "It's time to go."

"But I'm tired," the kid mumbled.

That was the problem with having kids in organizations like this. Sure, the kid was...not necessarily a _kid,_ maybe a little bit older, but it didn't stop the soft sighs of "This is boring," or "This is stupid," or "I'm tired of this."

"Rain's coming. You want to get caught in it, or what?"

The kid just hung there with a silent grin, eyes closed. 

He shrugged. "I'm going. We resume operations tomorrow."

"Yeah, yeah..."

With another low rumble, the clouds cracked open, the rain began to fall. He pulled his cap down as the downpour started, washing away the stains of blood, pattering at his hands, rolling down the grunt's face. Lashed away at the cold corpse, made it grow even colder. Pounded down on the kid's closed eyes, made them shut even tighter.

"Hmph. I'm leaving now."

"I'm leaving, too," the kid echoed.

The rain was too cold today.

He hated the rain.


	3. the mansion

_The subject is getting far too powerful. We have failed to curb its vicious tendencies..._

"He's here," the caretaker said, placing a hand on his shoulder. "Are you ready?"

"As ready as I'll ever be," he sighed, closing the notebook. "I'm not sure what we should say to him. Can we really be sure that this whole experiment is even going to work...?"

"Don't worry," the caretaker consoled, "It'll work out in the end. It always does. You'll see."

The scientist bowed his head. "I'd hate to leave things up to chance like that..."

The greying man simply made a low chuckle before loping back upstairs, his old, plodding footsteps rattling up the stairs. The scientist looked over his shoulder at the sleeping monster, waited for some time, and then went upstairs himself, to where the caretaker and the benefactor were waiting.

He had never met the benefactor before. Even so, the man wasn't different from what he had expected - dressed in a leather black trench coat and a dark fedora that was pulled over his eyes. Just as distant as he could expect of a man who had bought out a mansion, and started some terrible experiment in that very same house, and dumped two strangers in to observe the proceedings.

"Well, then," he said in a low voice, nodding to the scientist. "How have the experiments progressed?"

"It is a rather...violent creature," he began dryly.

"Good. That was what I wanted."

"But its power is unstoppable. No one can control it."

"Then find someone who can. What about the people I sent here? They tend to be good with pokémon..."

"This thing is barely a pokémon..."

"Do you have any qualms about this?"

"No. It's just the truth."

"Hm..."

"The child," the caretaker interrupted, "The child has been very good with helping us with the experiment. They play games with one another. Chess, for instance."

"Really? Chess is a fine game. Very strategic."

"A sign of its intelligence," the caretaker affirmed. "It keeps the mind sharp."

"Well, then," the man said, lowering his cap. "How have the results of the-"

"I'm sorry, but you'll have to excuse us for a moment." The scientist held the older man's shoulder and leaned in to his ear. "Are we sure that's such a good thing? A child like that, with that monster...it's not..."

"They're still only children," the caretaker softly assured the scientist before walking off with the benefactor. "Children tend to play together - it's natural. A natural part of childhood. Just leave them be. There's no need to worry!"

Yes, maybe that was natural. Maybe that was the sort of thing a child did.

But he knew that a child didn't come home smelling of explosives and smog. A child didn't train depraved, drooling Golbats and Alakazams living in madness and nightmares. A child didn't spend hours trying to get to sleep. A child didn't whisper things like, _"But I'm so tired; this is so stupid and I'm so tired."_ A child didn't hear things like, _"But we can't leave; they'll chase us and they'll kill us."_

A child didn't live being unable to move, being unable to touch the world outside. A child didn't feel shocks of electricity without breaking down in tears. A child didn't wake up with a start, gripped in panic, wracked with confusion, seething in paranoia. A child didn't plot, concoct plans or conspire over distant games of chess across glass walls.

Children didn't speak to each other about the last days of childhood. Children didn't speak to each other about hopeless tears in the rain. Children didn't speak to each other about meaning and meaninglessness.

He was supposed to leave them be, like the caretaker said.

And that was what he always did. He left them be. 

He left them be as they sat together, playing games of chess, crazyhouse and kamikaze. He left the monster child be as it stayed awake through the nights, lashing out at the objects outside, cracking and crashing everything with lashes of energy. He left the human child be during discussions with not-sisters about being tired, about having fun, about being anywhere, anywhere, anywhere but here.

If this was what people were supposed to allow children to do, then - then he didn't want to have to do anything with them. As the older men strolled outside over to the other labs, he stormed out the other doors, headed towards the docks. It would clear his head a bit, he decided, it would make things easier to-

He froze at the sight of the Gyarados slumped along the docks, its jowls hanging open, deep red eyes glancing around with paranoia, with wrath. The young girl stopped moving too, looking over her shoulder with something like horror, one foot off the docks as she clung to the sea dragon's scales. 

"What are you doing out here?" he whispered. "You shouldn't be here."

"We're not doing anything, really." The child was there, too, already on the pokémon's back. "We're going off for a little midnight swim, that's all. But I think you should go wish him a happy getaway. It'd be polite of you, you know?"

"...What are you talking about?"

"Nothing. It's going to be a blast, though." The child turned and looked up to the girl and remarked, "But a thunderstorm's on the horizon. We better get going."

"Yeah. You guys could use the rain, anyway," she murmured, looking at the water before climbing up on the sea dragon's head. 

The wind started to pick up with a soft whine, but then again, it didn't really sound like a whine at all. It sounded more like a shriek, a howl, a scream, even. And it just kept rising, just kept getting higher, higher and higher.

All the while, the scientist stood there, staring. _But what are they talking about? Are they leaving? Were they asked to leave? But we haven't even finished..._

"And here we go," the girl said over the breeze, prodding the Gyarados.

And suddenly, he heard something shatter behind him, and he turned around-

And then everything broke, in an explosion of light and sound and fire, consuming the sky as though the world was ending.


	4. the village

It was a life without surprises.

It was a life without hierarchies, without preferences, without questions. 

It was a life that was everything that they needed.

It was a life where the two of them were just a happy mother and child, moving in from a distant city in a distant land. The villagers treated them fairly and normally enough; the two of them never quite fit in, but they were never ostracized either. It was perfect.

Everything was perfect - it was a village far away from anywhere or anything important, far away from the smoldering ashes of the mansions, far away from the outrage of mobsters and madmen. This village, right by the coast of the ocean, right in the corner of the nation, was perhaps the most insignificant place in the world. Exactly what they needed. Everything that they needed.

"But we can't stay here forever," she said over a quiet dinner, leaning across the table to the kid. "You destroyed the mansion, you let loose their little experiment into the world. They're going to find us, and they're going to kill us. That's it. So we gotta keep moving."

"I don’t think so," the kid hummed, turning a knife between fingers. "They don't want to find us. Sure, maybe the peons will. Maybe even some of the executives – but the boss is smart - he doesn't want to find us. He's worried his creation is going to destroy everything he's got, so he's better off not trying to hunt it down. He's not going to do anything to us."

"Someone else might. You know how stupid some of those guys were - all about duty and sucking up to the higher-ups. Someone's going to try looking for us, you know?"

"Of course they'll try. And we'll be fine."

"Yeah, yeah," she grumbled. She tapped out a rhythm with her fork, some theme song from a kid's show. "...So what are you going to do, then? Sit around, double-lock the doors, watch the world go by? Wait for them to come find us?"

"But that'll be boring after a while, won't it?" The kid smiled in a way that always charmed everyone else, but always made something in her skitter away. "And you're still worried about the Rockets. Like I said, don't worry about it. I'll take care of it. You'll see." A pause. "But the others think you’re my mother, don’t they? Now it all makes sense. Mothers can't help but be worried, after all."

"God." She chuckled a bit. "God, I'd really hate to be your mother. You don't even know."

A soft, hollow laugh. "Don't worry about it. I'll find something fun to do in the meantime."

And the kid did find things to do, things like getting picked on by the boy next door and finding ways to beat him to the punch. The kid would go off and talk with the villagers, helping them with household chores and dealing with pokémon. And all the old women would laugh and say, _"Oh, what a saint that child is! So kind and so mature for being so young!"_ and the resident trainers would call out, _"Say, kid, c'mere and help me with Pidgeotto!"_ The kid was just so nice, after all, and so good with understanding pokémon and getting them to do the dirty work, so good with cleaning up after the messes other people made.

The kid would go into the resident professor's lab, and help him out with experiments and with pulling him out of moments of loss. He was the sort of man who knew everything there was to know about pokémon, but nothing about people, nothing about his life - no, nothing at all. But he knew that he liked the kid well enough, and so the kid would keep going back to learn things from him, about how there were ancient pokémon that would devour prey by draining their bodies, about how there were dragons that could cause horrific fires without even thinking.

Despite how small and insignificant the village was, every now and then there come people clad in designer suits and coats and patent-leather shoes, arriving on the backs of Fearow or Arcanine, on monsters that no one had seen before. Those men and women would stroll right into the professor's lab, old friends and old academics.

Sometimes the kid would go visit the lab when they arrived, and the professor was always delighted during those times: _"Ah, and this young child is - oh, what is your name? - yes, of course, that's it! This child's been a great help for us, and very talented with handling the pokémon. Yes, you and my grandson have been rivals since you two were babies! My grandson? His name is - erm, what is his name again? That's right! I remember now!"_

Life, for a time, had almost become ordinary.

Then, one morning, the kid came down as usual, but something was different in the smile, the stance, the way the bag got shifted over shoulders. 

They looked at each other, the television humming something about yellow brick roads or finding dead bodies or lullaby blues and _oh oh I love you-_

She looked into those dark eyes and nodded. 

"Right. All children leave home someday."


	5. the cave

"But this place is lasting forever, isn't it?" the voice echoed out from the cavern, and the grunt made a little sigh. _So soon?_ he thought to himself. _Ah well, all the more for me, then..._

He slunk forward, hands in his pockets. "All right then, kiddo. You aren't getting past here-" His voice died into the darkness of the cave. "K-kid? What...what the _fuck_ are you doing here?"

"Why, I'm just trying to get by," the former executive said with a song-like inflection. "And what might you be doing here?"

"You're dead," he breathed, a hand at his belt. _"Raticate!"_

The oversized, bloated rat shot out, fangs clattering as it made a loud shriek that echoed through the caves. At this, the kid sighed, lips parting in disapproval. "You're really going to fight me, little mouse? You're really, really going to fight me?"

He wasn't sure if that was addressed to him or his pokémon, but it didn't matter. "Raticate, use-"

"Did they promise you a promotion or a raise for defeating me? I can't see why you would fight me otherwise."

"You chose to stand against us! You gave up everything you had for nothing!" He snapped to his Raticate, "Super fang, _now-_ "

A snarl hissed through the air before a jet of embers crashed into Raticate. It made a painful whine that pierced through the air, skittering back, away from the grunt.

"You can't stand a chance against us." The kid scratched the Charmeleon's neck as it shambled in front of its master, approaching its enemy with a scouring glare. "You've always known that, haven't you? You'll let us stand aside, won't you?"

"You're on the blacklist. You're the first name. You - we're going to destroy you. We're going to destroy everything you have."

"Has it ever occurred to you that _I'm_ going to destroy you first?"

Raticate lunged at the Charmeleon, but was beaten back with the lizard's tail. The Charmeleon made a low rattling growl before letting loose a hot stream of fire again, licking at the howling rat's fur and skin, the stench of smoke and singes burning into the air.

"I think it has." The kid signaled for the pokémon to come back, leaving the rat convulsing with pain. "I've defeated you, anyway. May I move on, then? It's only common courtesy, you know."

"You're dead," his voice trembled. "You're dead, you're dead, you're _dead-_ "

"That's not a winner's attitude," came the sigh. "It goes more like this: you lose, and then you kindly bow out and back away. But that's not going to happen with you guys, is it? Oh, well. It'll be more fun than I thought, then." 

The grunt took two steps forward, barely thinking, thinking only of I'm going to stop this brat now, but then the Charmeleon stalked forward too, a smoldering snarl in his throat, eyes burning with something a little like madness. And so he moved back, first by walking, then by stumbling, then by falling.

"Good." The kid smiled. "Come on. Let's go."

He closed his eyes and listened to the echoes of their footsteps and whimpers of his pokémon, felt the cold wind weave through the cave, and saw only the darkness in his eyes.


	6. the bridge

The executive stepped away from the kid, calling back his pokémon. “So. You came back after all.”

“Yeah, I’m glad to see you too.” The kid made a soft, soft laugh; the Charmeleon remained silent, staring. “Not glad to see what’s become of you guys, though. Just look at you – you’ve resorted to recruiting kids. Why? Are you guys hoping for a repeat?”

“A repeat? No, never. We’re not looking for anyone like you.” He snorted, eyeing the kid for some weakness, some forgotten defense – but between those dark, sharp eyes and the dragon, there’s wasn’t anything he could do. “You, on the other hand – you took the challenge. Tired of playing with the preschoolers?”

“Well, you don’t seem to be. That’s why you volunteered for this spot, right?” A pause, a searching gaze. “Or maybe it’s easier to get kids to steal and go out fossil-hunting? Why, I don’t know if you’re trying to educate them or corrupt them. You guys really fell apart while I was gone, didn’t you?”

“Will you quit your bullshit?”

The kid’s eyebrows rose with amusement. “Yep, I was right. It didn’t take much for you guys to collapse at all. At this rate, I might as well sit back, relax, and just watch the fall.”

“You’re wrong,” he seethed, ignoring the snarls from the Charmeleon and stepping up to lean in the kid’s face. “You think we’ve fallen apart, but no, no, quite the contrary – take one step out of this town, and just try to hide from us. We’re the ones running experiments, we’re the ones producing new technology. We’re the future. And you know what else? We run Saffron, now. We run the capital. We run Kanto. We are Kanto. And what about you? Look at you and look at the world – who are you?”

“Just some kid, right?”

“Yes, just some kid, trying to take down the world.” He leaned in to say something more, but the Charmeleon made a low, rattling snarl deep in his throat. The executive made one, too, as he backed away from the looming monster.

The kid looked down at the bridge, arms crossed. “Yeah, I get it.” A shake of the head. “Okay, well, no, I don’t. You guys run Saffron now? You guys are Kanto? If you’ve got the high life now, then what are doing all the way out here? What are you doing sitting around on a bridge? Sure, the town’s got a nice pool. There’s a lovers lane, too. Ah, tell me – is the boss having love problems?”

“Why did you quit?”

The kid stopped musing. “Oh? You have to ask?”

“No, I don't have to. I don't give a shit, kid. I’m only asking because…” He looked at the kid’s eyes, felt a shiver run down his spine. He didn’t want to say this – he didn’t want to say this at all, he had this sick, terrible feeling about the whole idea – but it was the boss’s words. “…He wants you to come back.”

The kid broke out into a helpless grin, shoulders shaking a little. “Oh, please, really?” The other grunts looked like they wanted to kill me.”

“They don’t understand.” He shook his head. “You don’t understand, either. You were a top leader in Team Rocket – you could have run the world with us. You could’ve had everything, but then you left. But the boss says you’ll become one again, if you return to us. We’ll stop chasing you. And we’ll give you what you want.”

“You don’t have what I want.”

“We have everything.”

“No, you don’t have everything. You don’t have the experiment, do you? Is it around here? Is that why you crawled all the way back to this backwater place?”

“Look, kid, if you don’t come back, it’s war.”

“It’s always been a war, ever since I left.”

“We’ll find you. We’ll kill you. And we’ll find the girl, too. We’ll find that girl who ran off with you.”

“Who do you mean by, “we?” You mean you and your paleontologist army?”

And he wanted so badly to just kill the kid there and then, but the little dragon seemed to reflect his desire back on him, judging from the way it hunched down, the way smoke wisped from between its teeth, the way its dark eyes burned.

So all he could do was utter, “You could have had everything.”

And the kid smiled and said, “I’d rather have nothing, really.”


	7. the tomb

“Have you come to pay your respects?” she heard the old channeler croak from outside the tower. “Oh, bless you, child…”

The girl looked up from the little Cubone, a small frown on her face. It was strange – she couldn’t see any of the ghosts now. They were all gone. Gone, disappeared, vanished. But where would they go? Why would they go?

“Do you think they got scared, Cubone?” It blinked at her question, and she knew it was stupid. People were the ones who were afraid of ghosts. She wasn’t, though, even though she could see them when everyone else couldn’t. There were a lot more scary things in real life than in death. That had to be true – after all, nothing could scare a ghost. She tried a lot of things, but nothing worked.

But there were still no more ghosts. So she hopped up on her feet, and was ready to go dashing out until she felt the bone-monster tug at her skirt with a soft, trembling whimper. “Oh…” She held out her hand. “Hey, let’s go outside. We should see who she’s talking to.”

The Cubone made another cry, reaching up to clutch her fingers. They walked off together, down the stairs, to the foot of the tower. The old woman was there, talking to someone. 

It must’ve been another traveller, another traveller passing through. Passing through, coming by, going away. But it was weird – this one wasn’t slipping through like a breeze, or jumping on a bike and speeding out like a gale. None of the other travellers stopped by to linger around, to talk to the somber people.

“Do you know what happened here, in this town?” the channeler murmured, clutching her charms. “The Cubone’s mother died trying to escape from Team Rocket.”

“Team Rocket?” 

Standing next to the traveller was an old man, who made a low, weary groan. “We tried saving her,” he said, his clothes as grey as the clouds gathered above the tower, “We tried helping her escape. But they refused to listen to us. She was only trying to protect her children, but…” He coughed as a ghost shivered through his body in a distant, dreamy drift. He grasped his cane tighter with a low groan, shaking his head. “…And now the Cubone have lost their mother.”

There was the shopkeeper, too, who walked out of the store with a disgusted glare. “It’s because of the skulls. People pay a lot for a Cubone’s skull – and ever since they killed Marowak, her children are helpless. Team Rocket will do anything for the sake of gold.”

And there was the young woman, carrying her groceries, walking into the conversation. “Team Rocket?” She snapped her head back and forth. “Oh, I hate those terrible Rockets. That poor Marowak…”

And now there were a lot of people here. All of them, alive but not-so-well. All of them, complaining about the horrible people who visited the town and did bad things, things that made her lost Cubone cry, things that made the ghosts wail and attack people, things that made her wake up in the middle of the night.

When those things happened, when those times came and she couldn’t sleep, she snuck out of the house in the dead of the night, darting from shadows and slipping between sniggering ghosts. And she would take Cubone with her, and they would go into the tower together, and count the ghosts like they would count stars and sheep:

_“I see one. Was she your sister? Was that one your brother? Look at that one – the one who’s barking at the banisters. I think he was a Growlithe. There’s one dancing around – over there, in the moonlight. That one’s a Clefairy. Hey, there’s him, the ghost who always tells people to get out. Was he your grumpy grandpa? Maybe that one in the corner is your papa. I lost my papa, too.”_

And the ghosts were here, too. But she couldn’t count them. Ten, fifty, one hundred – but what came after one hundred? So many ghosts, gathered around the people like the way the clouds gathered overhead. She could hear them whispering snatches of nonsense, but she could tell what they were talking about, considering the way they slipped closer and closer to the traveller.

This traveller really wasn’t like any of the others. Cubone must have thought so, too, because as soon as it saw the traveller, it made some keening cry before dropping its bone and clinging onto her leg. “Cubone? What’s wrong?”

The woman carrying her groceries looked down with a fretful frown, knelt down beside her and Cubone. “There now, it’s okay,” she crooned, setting down her groceries and cradling the Cubone to her chest. “You’ll be safe with us. Don’t worry…”

The Cubone looked up, looked around the town, and buried its face back into her chest.

“That’s what Team Rocket has done.” The old man shivered at the sight. “That’s…they never cared. Not once.”

“I’ve run into those guys a few times,” the traveller remarked, ignorant to the way the ghosts clambered further. “Just a little while ago, I was in Cerulean, and there they were. They’re not unstoppable, really. It didn’t take much to scare them off, you know.”

“You?” The old man looked up with brighter eyes than normal. “You were there? You solved the burglaries?”

“I did what everyone else couldn’t. I seem to be rather good at that.”

And now the ghosts made this distant, clattering clashing crashing sound as they slipped back and away.

“Did you really…? Can they really be stopped?”

“If it’s Team Rocket, of course. It’s fun.” The traveller stretched out with a soft sigh. The ghosts looked over; they seemed angry. Angry, indignant, furious. But they seemed confused, too. She wasn’t sure what that meant.

Now everyone was starting to talk amongst themselves, gossiping about _how can that happen_ and _how about that._ But she wasn’t at all sure about this – no, not at all. As Cubone cried and as the traveller walked away, she ran off to the town’s exit. “Excuse me!”

The traveller turned and looked down at her with an amused smile. The ghosts fell silent, watching her every move. “I was just wondering…” she breathed, tugging her sleeves. She breathed, but then her breath hitched at the sight of some ghastly white hand clutching the traveller’s shoulder.

“And just what were you wondering about?” The traveller said that with a light tone. Even so, the hand clutched desperately. Clutched, in a way that said _we know what you have done, we know what you will do—_

“I…” She shivered, and the ghosts shivered, too. “I was…do you… Do you believe in ghosts?”

"Ghosts? Like, things that come back from the dead? Things that you hoped were gone that suddenly come back? Those kinds of ghosts?"

"Yeah."

The traveller stared at her for a moment – and then smiled, an unnerving smile that made her want to shudder, more than the ghosts ever did. The sky shuddered, too, even before the rain came.

Maybe it shuddered for the same reasons she did, for the same reasons the ghosts did even now. Maybe it was because there was one thing that could make a ghost angry and confused. Maybe it was because there was one thing that could terrify a ghost.

All the while, in that moment of silence, all she could see were those dark eyes and that smile.

And then:

"Yes."


	8. the casino

“So. I must say, I am impressed you got this far.”

“You are?” The child shrug before motioning for the exhausted Charmeleon to come limping back. “I’m not that surprised myself.”

Nidoking made a triumphant, bellowing roar before disappearing in a flash of light. He tossed the pokéball in his hand before turning back to the child. “Perhaps for a long time yet you could have carried on this hopeless crusade. But it is over, now.”

“It might be, maybe,” the child said, unfazed.

“It’s over. There is no question about it.” He ran a hand over his jacket before tucking it in his pocket. “Tell me – do you understand why you have lost?”

The child looked to the Charmeleon for a moment, then nodded. “Yeah, I get it. Sometimes, it’s easy to forget that there was something else you were supposed to take care of first. It’s a lot like chess.”

“No, that isn’t why,” the boss said, his voice a low, patient rumble. “It is because you do not understand the way life works. It cannot be helped – you are much too young. You do not understand the world yet, and so the world will conquer you.”

The child sighed and sat down, slumped into one of the chairs as though the hideout were a home. A second, a minute passed, and then the child spoke again: “No, I think I know what life is like. Everyone can.”

“And what might your insight be?”

“It’s _boring._ ”

He made an amused chuckle. “You’re still young, that’s why.”

“And? How does that change anything?”

“It changes everything.” He slipped a cigarette and lighter from his pocket, struck a flame. “Without proper experience, without proper knowledge, your perception on the world is small. You don’t know anything about it. As I said, it cannot be helped – you still fear the dark and you take shelter from the rain. You are afraid. And I believe that’s part of what has driven you here – fear. Fear that we will destroy you, and so you attempt to destroy us first.”

He paused, letting his words hang in the air, letting his cigarette hang from his lips. The child simply stared at him with a wry, questioning look. He felt as though it were a prompt for him to continue.

“But you must understand something – when you are in my position, you see the world. You see how people truly are. You begin to understand all the subtle actions that influence the course of our lives. When you are in my position, when you realize all of this, you can control everything without ever being known. Like some nameless master.” He gave a firm nod. “Yes. That is who we are: we are the masters of the world in our own, quiet ways. Do you see? Do you see the beauty in that?”

“Own, quiet ways… But that’s no fun.”

“You,” he reiterated, “Are only a child.” Looking at them closer, he could see all the fine, subtle resemblances between the child and the Charmeleon. He could only shake his head. “You decide things by what is and what is not boring. You assume things based on your first impressions. That’s barely above our primal instincts. You are just like a pokémon, aren’t you? Is that why you understand them so well? Is that why you are so good with handling them?”

The child shifted in place, a breezy smile playing at lips. “I don’t know. Maybe.”

“That is why you left. That is why you could not stay with us. A child like you could never understand what I hope to achieve.”

“No, I get it, all right. I just think it’s stupid. You guys rant on about running the world, but you guys don’t seem to run anything. Actually, it seems more like you’re running away from me. And I’m just a child, right? No one should run away from a kid.”

“Perhaps the others run – the less knowledgeable, those with less power. Yet I defeated you. I did not run away. I do not run away from anything.”

“You run. You’re always running.” The child leaned forward. “When the rain comes, you run and take shelter, you hide and you wait for the rain to stop. When the night comes, you turn on your lights, you hide in flashing lights and sound. And when I left, you never tried finding me. I had to find you – down here, through some stupid little maze in some stupid little casino.” The child was about to continue on before looking down at the floor. “Okay, well, no. The casino isn’t stupid. I like it, actually. Kind of addictive. Have you ever tried the slots?”

“You’re being ridiculous.”

“Okay, I’ll take that as a no. Still, you should try them. They’re fun. And they’re proof that there are some things you just can’t control. And you’re not in control, really. You don’t have any power at all.”

“We have broken away from the laws that shaped our world. I have risen above this…this mess in the world. I have created my own life. I have created my own laws. I have created my own world. That is power.”

“You have all this power, and you use it to run casinos and bully the Cubone. Yeah. That’s power. Christ, is this all you guys ever talk about?”

The boss looked to the Charmeleon, bruised and bleeding but glaring in his eyes, its tail slithering in the air. He looked to the child, too, at the child’s soft, whimsy smile and at the lamplight in their eyes. 

No matter how beaten down they were, they would still get up. They would still get up, they would still keep coming, until…until they would stop. He could see it in Charmeleon’s eyes. He could see it in the child’s eyes, too. In any other place, in any other situation, this would have been admirable, desirable – but here? It was only a hopeless endeavor.

“I had to make many sacrifices to get to where I am now. Many sacrifices, but here I am now – I have an army. I have a nation. And there you are, you and your piteous little pokémon. You are nowhere near me. And I’m not about to let you stop anything.” He snuffed his cigarette against the arm of one of the couches. “I am finished speaking with you.”

“You’re talking like a guy in a dream. A really delusional dream.”

“Quite the contrary – you are the one who is stuck in a dream.” He simply couldn’t take it anymore. “Perhaps when you grow out of playing silly, imaginary games, we will meet again. I can only hope it will be more…productive. Until then, I shall step aside.” He looked into the child’s eyes. “I will allow you to leave. But if you attempt to stand in our way again, if you refuse to join us again, then you will not walk away from us again.”

“All right.” Still, seated, the child nodded once. “Okay, then. We’ll meet again. We’ll meet again, and then we’ll see who’s the one that’s curled up in a dream.” The child got up and glanced around the room, then at him. “But somehow, I doubt it’s me.” Then, to the Charmeleon: “Come on. We’re going back up.”

He heard the deep, exhausted rattle of the elevator as it clambered back up, back up to the casino. When he strained his ears, he could hear the soft, soft sound of human voices underneath the ricochet of spinning slots. But above all that, against all those sounds, he could hear the steady, gentle patter of the rain.

There were many things to be done, many things that needed to be accomplished when one had as much power as he did. But it would have to wait.

He sat in the couch, lit another cigarette. He blew smoke into the air, closed his eyes, and tried to ignore the rain.


	9. the tower

“Oh, you’re not saving anyone, kid!”

“Can’t I at least save myself?”

The executive whipped his hand down to his belt, his boots skidding against the smooth stone of the gravetower roof. _Didn’t the boss say he taught this kid a lesson? Didn’t this kid get crushed at the hideout?_ It didn’t matter, though – this was going to end now.

“Now, Alakazam!” The Pokémon manifested in a flash, gazing ahead with dark, dull eyes. He would never get used to the way it barely moved, to the way it gazed through him rather than at him – but it didn’t stop it from being one of the most powerful weapons in their arsenal.

Of course, the kid wasn’t impressed. “Seriously? You can’t win on your own, so you’re using my old team?”

“Yeah. Your Alakazam. You can’t complain – you’re the one who abandoned them. You’re the one who threw out a perfectly good squad. You’re no better than anyone else.”

“When did I ever say I was?”

“Since you quit!”

“Ah. It’s a shame you see it that way, don’t you? You never give a second thought to anything.” The kid sighed, then looked to the unmoving psychic. “Still, let’s see if Alakazam agrees. Give me a minute, won’t you?”

“Now, Alakazam—!”

“Go on,” the kid whispered, looking at the psychic’s eyes, looking into those dead grey eyes. “What are you going to do, Alakazam? Are you going to attack me? That would be sad. I mean, don’t you remember how we started? Just you and me? How you always got scared and ran away and I’d have to run off and find you? How you were really bad with your powers at first, but then you got better and better at them?”

“Goddammit, use _Psychic!_ ” He glanced back at the kid incredulously. _Seriously? This is how you’re doing it? Trying a nostalgia trip? Jesus Christ…_

But maybe it was working after all. Alakazam didn’t attack. It simply stood there, spoons hanging in its hands, without any movement, any attack, any thought. So the kid continued the croon. 

“Don’t you remember our little exercises? How you learned how to fight until it didn’t hurt fighting anymore? Don’t you remember how you always got scared when night came? Are you still scared of it now? You were always afraid of ghosts, weren’t you? Do you believe in ghosts, Alakazam? Do you? Could you hear the mother ghost talking to you, too?” A pause, a breath. “You’re not alone. I heard it, too.”

Alakazam still wasn’t moving. It only gazed at its former master with a dreamy, hazy countenance, as though it had just woken up.

“What did it say to you, Alakazam? It said a lot of things to me. About how I killed it. About how I’m a monster. Is that what it said to you, too? Is that what everyone says to you when you hear their thoughts? Is that why you shut everyone out? But you can’t just do that, Alakazam. Things get worse when you try running away from them.”

Out of nowhere, the psychic made this howl that sliced through the air, through the stormclouds, a howl that made the tower shudder and the sky flash with something like horror. There were pulses of psychic energy warping about as the monster trembled, spasmed. He had never heard it make a sound; he had never seen its face change, let alone contort the way it did now.

And then it fell over, curled up, clutching its head, trembling. Feeling pain, maybe – all he could do was just stare down at it. A ghost slithered up from its head like smoke, drawing its tongue along the edges of its jagged mouth, dragging its fingers through the sky and looking around like it was just another lazy summer day. Upon seeing the kid, it grinned.

The kid’s grin was almost as wide as the ghost’s. “We just needed a minute, that was all.”

“You—?”

“Were you expecting me to talk to it? To be friends, to get along happily? Like sunshine and rainbows?”

“What the fuck are you _doing?_ ”

“I’m doing a lot of things. Saving the world. Saving the souls of dead ghosts, saving people from themselves, saving money at the markets when they hear I tore you guys apart. And I’m even saving you guys, too. I mean, if all you want to do is become the face of the world, then where’s the fun in that?”

“You’re supposed to be the one who’s good with pokémon, but you just fucked up one of your own—”

“He was tired, too. Just as tired as I was. Couldn’t you see it?” The kid made an almost sympathetic glance. “He had to go into his own dreams just to get out of life. I wanted him to wake up – and Haunter really likes dreams, don’t you know?”

The ghost made a high-pitched, girly giggle, and fluttered back to her trainer. And he just stared, and stared, and stared.

He thought: _you really are fucked up, aren’t you?_

He thought: _I have to warn him._

He thought: _I have to get out of here._

He said: “You’re not getting away with this!”

Even as he and the other Rockets stormed off the tower, he could hear the kid call out to him, “You say that, but I always do, don’t I? I always, always get away.”


	10. the orphanage

“Why were you up there, anyway?” the child asked, fidgeting with a teaspoon. He looked back and made a warm, gentle smile. He would never understand how someone could do something so big like fending off that…that brutal organization, and then go back to doing some so childish so quickly.

"I went there by my own free will. I was trying to calm the soul of the Cubone's mother," the caretaker said. “Still – it looks like you managed to send her soul off to the afterlife. Thank you.”

“It was nothing, really. Nothing at all.” The child leaned back and looked around the house, at the walls covered in crude marker drawings of children and pokémon, of people dressed in black and ghosts, of a lonely Cubone looking at the stars. “Did you always run this place?”

“No, not always.” The caretaker sat in the seat across from the child, setting down the teapot. “Only when I moved here, not too long ago. It was from far away.”

“I know what that’s like. Moving from far away, I mean. Kind of stormy.”

“Hm.” Outside, he watched two of the boys chasing after the silly, energetic Nidorino with wild grins and winded laughter. “And you? What brought you out here? These are dangerous times for a child to be wandering about.”

“I was just looking for something to do. Something fun.”

“Well, I hope you considered this to be fun!” He laughed softly and poured out two mugs of tea. The child looked at him with a smile, one that seemed normal enough yet odd all the same – of course, heroes never quite fit in with the ordinary, did they?

“Yeah, it was.” The child blew into the mug before looking around the room some more. “Is that a chess board?”

“I…er, yes. Yes, it is…”

“I used to play chess all the time when I was younger. Do you teach the kids how to play?”

“I brought that with me when I moved. I don’t teach the children, no. It’s…it’s a little difficult for them. And it’s better for them to play outside, too.” He cleared his throat with a sheepish smile. “It’s a good game, though.”

“Yeah. I had a friend to play it with. That was always fun.”

There went the girl and her Cubone, too. Now that they were gone, now that they had left, maybe its nightmares would stop.

Maybe his nightmares would stop, too. Nightmares that sent him jolting awake, nightmares that made the days long and the nights hard, nightmares that made him pray more fervently, more desperately at the tower. Nightmares of fire and a monster stalking towards him and words like _Did you think you could run away? Did you think you could be happy? Did you think you could forget the pain? Oh, you can never do that. You can never do that—_

“Do you raise your pokémon with love and care?” he suddenly asked.

“They’re what I love the most. I train them, I listen to them, I teach them everything I know about life.”

“I see. That’s…that’s good. I think people might fail at every turn if they don’t pay attention to others. They’ll never be satisfied if they don’t have love. That’s what I’ve learned, at least.” The caretaker sighed, and looked back at the child. “Oh? Have you finished already?”

“I think so. Thanks for the flute, anyway. I need to wake up a few guys out there, anyway.”

“Yes, Snorlax have a tendency to sleep in the most inconvenient places.” He forced himself back on his feet. “I hope it will help you on your quest. And I hope everything will work out well for you. Again, I…thank you for all that you’ve done for us.” He folded his hands behind his back and made his broadest smile.

The child smiled, too. “It’ll work out in the end. It always does.”

“Well… Not always, no.” He made a playful little wince, but it stung all the same. “I’ve learned that from life, too.”

“Oh? You’ve changed your mind? I didn’t expect that.” The child looked at him with a disappointed frown – there was something curious about those dark eyes; there was something about those eyes that seemed so…

His heart stopped.

“Oh, oh god. You came back.”

“Yes, I did. I wasn’t expecting to see you here, though.”

“You were the one who set that monster…”

“I was the one, yes. Chess is a fun game, but playing it day after day – that’s not too fun. I figured he needed to live a little. That was what we both needed.”

"Do you know what you've done?" The caretaker's voice crawled through his dry, cracked lips. "Do you...do you _understand-?_ "

The child made a sympathetic sound, one that scraped and ripped into his ears. "Oh, but I do understand. I don't think you do, though." 

“I never wanted him to – I never meant to – I, I’ve done all that I can to redeem myself, I, I want to…”

The child gave him a pat on the shoulder, one that shot against him like a bullet tearing into his heart. "See, here's the thing – I know what I’ve done. I understand what I’ve done. And I don't care. As long as it's fun. And this is very, very fun."

"I shouldn't have done that at all. I...I should never have made that...that monster. I should never have let..."

"But I'm glad you did. So cheer up."

He stared, he stared, he stared, and the way the child stood looked more and more like the way the monster did in his dreams. He fell back in his chair, heart pounding, lips trembling. “What…what have you done? Why did…why did you come back? What are you going to do…?”

_I’m going to kill you, of course. I’m going to break your fingers and break your knees and fire electricity in your veins and tear your mind apart and make you my little puppet and make you solve stupid mazes and stupid puzzles and make you wonder if that’s all there is to life—_

The child stroked his death-white hair. “I came back because it was fun, that’s all. And I did what I wanted to do. And I’m going to do whatever I want. You’ll see. You don’t have to worry.”

_Worry, worry, worry, worry, worry—_

He turned away and buried his face in his hands. After a moment’s pause, the child bent down beside him, and murmured in his ear:

"You don't have to worry at all."


	11. the company

When the morning came, there had been silence. Not the blaring of her alarm clock, not the shouts of the raucous Rocket grunts - just silence. For a moment, it felt as though something was wrong, but it could have easily been part of the haze of waking up from her fuzzy dreams, and so the moment passed.

The rest of the morning had gone normally, with a hot shower and hot coffee and hot toast (though after work, a bread run was in order, she noted with brief annoyance). There were other parts of the morning that still weren't normal, like the peons that loitered around town - they were supposed to patrol around the city and enforce curfew, but these days, they tended to sit and play cards and joke around. She wasn't sure if that sight would ever become normal, no matter how many days, weeks, months went by, no matter how much time passed.

There were others things that she simply hadn't seen before - like that trainer who was strolling out of the pokécenter, or the guard who was fast asleep at the company's entrance. 

_Ha, he's asleep... What, was he out drinking all night?_ She shrugged. Well, at least he wasn't blocking the doors - no need to wake the sleeping dragon, then.

As usual, the lobby was empty - it wasn't like anyone was ever here to ask for help anymore. That meant there wasn't anyone there to help her work the damn elevator, either, and so she had to take the stairs instead. And she didn't like them at all, not after hearing that story about the furious executive who shoved the old guy down the stairs.

It was a quick trip, though considering how her office was just on the first floor. Still, it meant that she had to be alone. She didn't like that at all, either. That floor was where all they all hung out, that bunch of hotshot scientists who ordered the new productions. At least she wasn't involved in...whatever it was they were doing. Something about creating a new pokéball that could catch anything in the world without a fight. There were other things, too, things that made perfectly sober office workers stay awake through the night at dusty old pubs. 

_As long as I do the work I do..._ She repeated that part of the deal in her head. _Some deal it was - more like a threat. I can't trust any of these guys. I can't, but..._

But it was the only thing she had, wasn't it?

And it looked like she would need it today, considering how the scientists weren't so smug and relaxed as they usually were - they seemed more bunched up, more secretive, more paranoid. The guy doing the patrols on this floor wasn't looking so good, either, judging from the way his eyes shifted around, judging from how he clutched the whip in his hands. Even the Koffing that the Rockets put up as an extra defense measure, even the Koffing clustered around the ceiling seemed hesitant, nervous. On a day like today, more than ever, she was better off playing along.

 _So, today I do that one technique, right? That's it..._ She sat down in her office, set up the computer and set her hands on the keyboard, and poured out long lines of code.

So that was how her morning was, then. Normal enough. Something was different, something was going to happen later, considering how everyone else here was acting - like the gathering of clouds before a storm, like the moment before an orchestra played. But everything was still normal. Maybe it was because their boss was coming? To check on that new device?

 _Seriously,_ she thought, _why are they making so many weird projects? There can't be anything that can't be caught normally. And it sure as hell isn't like they're a bunch of pacifists or activists. A pokéball that can master anything? Honestly—_

—that was when everything shattered.

She wasn't sure what it was, but she heard the windows break and that was all that it took to send her under the desk, cowering. That was good, considering that the Koffing and Weezing let loose their smog of noxious gas before exploding with such a force that sent the walls around her office crashing apart.

When the dust settled, when the powder of the walls floated back to the floors, she peered up from her arms, looked out of what was left of the wall. There wasn't a thought that could come to her mind, not at all.

The patroller charged down the other end, with a voice that was something like terrified rage. _“Hey! Hey! The kid - the traitor - Machoke! Seismic Toss!"_

From the other end of the hall, there was only a series of clacking claws on the tiled floors before the Machoke came hurtling down the hall - before getting launched back even faster by a massive jet of water, one that sent the muscleman crashing into the grunt, who only made a winded, pained cry before flying down the other end with a loud crack.

"Who...I...who...are...?" she managed to call out, stuck between wanting to see who was out there and wanting to stay curled up under the desk. When the doorknob clattered and the barely-attached door swung open, she opted for hiding.

"Please! Don't come here! I didn't—" She curled up tighter before shooting a quick glance at the person who had just come inside--

"Oh. I..." She lowered her arms, swallowed thickly. "I thought you... I thought you were Team Rocket."

"That's funny," the intruder said, patting the impassive stone pokémon that followed its trainer. "Not many people think that, now."

For a moment, the three of them could only breathe. The intruder - the intruder who was just some kid, who was just that trainer she saw yawning and stretching out of the pokécenter - the intruder surveyed what was left of her office. The Kabutops looked straight ahead at her, dragging its scythes along the floor, its claws clicking against the tiles.

"Do you know where he is?"

"W-who?"

"Him – the boss."

The Kabutops looked at her in the eyes, drawing up its scythes.

"The head honcho."

It whipped its head back to the open door, to where one of the Koffing was floating by.

"The master of—"

"At the top," she said absently, still watching as the scythed monster lunged to the little bomb. "Everyone said he'd go to the top - to see the president. He wanted to meet with the president."

"Why, exactly?"

It was a silent attack, without a sound passed between the monsters as the scythes swiped through the air. She couldn't watch now.

"He wanted to check on a new project. Something he wanted us to work on. It was...it was like, he called it a Master Ball. It's supposed to catch anything."

"Oh? You mean he’s really going to do that? He’s really, really going to try it…?” The intruder pulled a chair over and sat down. “Sounds interesting. Are you a part of it?"

"No, no," she said, looking at the intruder's – the child's – face. "I just make TMs. You know, the machines you use to teach pokémon new battle techniques? I made one a few days ago. It's - it's Self Destruct." She crawled out from under the desk, feeling around for the small device. "This is it - you can have it. For...for fighting them. Just don't..."

"Ah, but I don't need it. You can give it to someone from Team Rocket, though. I think it suits them more, don't you?"

She made a numb nod as the Kabutops clattered back in, having eaten...whatever it ate out of that Koffing. It glanced back up at its trainer, utterly calm, utterly unfazed.

"Why are... Are you...are you here to save us?"

The intruder blinked, then shrugged. "I woke up this morning, and just figured that today was the best day to just blow up this place. That's all it took, really. And I have some business with the boss I need to take care of, anyway."

Considering the Kabutops, considering how this child made that sort of entrance... _I...I don't want to know what sort of business it's about._

Far off, somewhere else on the floor, she heard the loud shouts of several grunts as they ran down the steps. The intruder glanced out, sighed, then got up, looking back at her. "Well, then. It looks like I've got some things I need to do. After you, Kabutops." The door was held open as the Kabutops stalked back out, and the intruder looked around the room once more. "You have a nice office. You might need to get some renovations later, though."

And out they went, down to the halls, down to whatever business they had to handle. She sat back against her desk and looked up at the flickering lights in the ceilings. She wasn't sure what else to do. Despite the shouts, despite the blasts, despite the echoing roars of battle, everything felt more silent than ever before.


	12. the hallway

A long, deep breath, an echoing whip snap.

A sharp glare, a loud pounding of the heart.

He whispered -

"You dare betray Team Rocket?"

A tilt of the head, a click of the tongue.

A smile crawling across lips, a nod.

An almost mirthful chuckle, and then -

"Yes."


	13. the meeting

That day, he realized just how fragile and tenuous everything could be.

Physically, it was clear - clear from all the shattered stone and glass scattered around the room, from the way the walls trembled and the floors shook every time the enraged Rhyhorn tried plowing into the impassive Kabutops. Every time that roar sounded through the room, he wrapped his arms around his head again because he didn't know what would collapse next – would it be the statue? The ceiling? The sky?

"We were in the middle of discussing a very vital business proposition—!"

"Doesn't seem to be that vital if you're wasting your time with me!"

There went that pseudo-matador game again, with the scythe-monster barely moving to dodge the Rhyhorn's charging assault. And there went the walls again, rattling and rumbling.

It was so easy for the mind to fall apart, too - the president reached out and wrapped his arms around the sobbing secretary. "Please, calm down - this will be over soon, I am sure—"

"Oh god, we're going to _die—_ I, I never wanted this to happen, I, I never thought once, I - oh, _god—_ "

In the corner of the room, he pulled her closer, and watched the fight. Every now and again, Kabutops would launch a jet of water on the ground just before the Rhyhorn, sending the monster sliding and crashing into the walls. The ancient monster would charge after it, slicing at its vulnerable enemy with those sickly sharp scythes.

"I never thought this was going to—" She buried her face back into her knees, rocked back and forth and mumbled nonsense to herself. He pulled her closer, even closer.

"Get up, Rhyhorn! I command you to stand! Attack!"

The spiked monster rolled back up and snapped at the approaching Kabutops, sending it hopping back.

"Okay, then. Just use Hydro Pump."

The Kabutops hunched down, then darted around on the floor, toes making a sharp _clickclickclickclickclick-_

Boom.

An abrupt blast of water sent the Rhyhorn flying through the air, sent it crashing down with a crack and a roar.

"See, he doesn't seem to like water. You don't either, boss. I'd say that makes you just like a pokémon, doesn't it?"

"Rhyhorn!"

The prehistoric monster came clattering over to the prone spiked beast and began slicing across its stomach with those scythes, the stomach that wasn't as protected as the rest of its body, the stomach that _bled-_

Battles were meant to be acts of grace and honor, works of art.

But this? This wasn't graceful, this wasn't honorable. This was horror. This was a monstrosity. This was...

The boss called back his pokémon, which made the Kabutops make a sharp hiss of annoyance, annoyance at its quarry, its prey being stolen away from it.

"Keep your nose out of grown-up affairs," he murmured to the child. "Now, then. Dugtrio!"

There was a sudden flash of light, but nothing had come out - until the floor cracked open as three mole-heads burst out, the three of them shrieking and squabbling at each other. "Your enemy is there, Dugtrio – Dig!"

The Kabutops stalked towards the odd new enemy - it must have been its first time seeing it, considering the way it tilted its head. The three heads yelped at each other some more before diving back into the floors, causing such a rapid rumble underneath that made the president want to fall all over again, despite the fact he was seated.

"An earthquake?" The secretary clutched her head now. "An earthquake, an earthquake, an earthquake..."

"It's not an earthquake. Please, remain calm. You can't worry..."

Snapping out of the ground came two of the heads, clamping down around each of the startled Kabutops's arms. The third head rocketed up and smashed into the monster's body with a sound that made the president wince, too - even though he wasn't sure just who he was hoping to win, anyway.

"Is that all? Then slash them, Kabutops."

It didn't seem to be in any pain - not visibly, at least. It suddenly managed to whip its scythes at an angle to scratch at the twin heads clutching its arms, freeing itself, then dove in to stab into the vulnerable head.

"Go on, Kabutops. Finish them off."

"Get out, Dugtrio!" Following their master's order, the twin heads headbutted the Kabutops with enough force to throw it off, then burrowed back into the ground with their whimpering, bleeding brother. "Then Fissure!"

Kabutops peered into the hole carved into the floor, as though trying to seek out the burrowing monsters - then snapped back up as a low, subtle tremor rocked through the broken floor.

"Kabutops, on my word—"

Then the floors tore apart, split open like a chasm, like an open wound and collapsed in, straight down the middle. It split apart so badly that he could look down and see the floor below, and it was such a drop from here to there, such a drop that made him press even further back against the wall.

"Now, over there."

The Dugtrio peered up from the opposite corner, trying to see the fate of its opponent. Each of them were hurt but one head was bleeding across its face, its eyes, but it looked up anyway-

And it received a horrible torrent of water in its face. And it howled. And it screamed.

Without another question, without another command, the boss called back his pokémon. The remaining monster snapped back over to him, striking its claws on the shattered floor. It had been denied of its prey twice now, and the president momentarily wondered just who it was going to go after next-

"This isn't a good place to fight, Kabutops. Come back."

It faded away in a dull red flash. The two opponents looked to each other for a long time - the boss stared and the child smiled.

"Now, Nidoqueen!"

"Come, Gengar."

The colossal poison-type came out with a deep call, standing on one of the few stable parts of the floor left. Then there came the ghost, arriving with a dance, a twirl, and then a fluttering triple-flip in the air. 

"Please make this stop, please, make this end!"

"I implore both of you - you cannot continue your fight here! It's too dangerous!"

"Thunderbolt," was the boss's only reaction.

Charging from the Nidoqueen's horn was a ball of electricity that was aimed and shot at the giggling ghost, who merely twisted away, landing on the tips of its toes on the very edge of the abyss, scraping along in a silly little pirouette.

" _Blizzard,_ " he called with a hint of urgency.

She inhaled, the air around her growing suddenly so, so cold - then blasted out a wide swath of whipping winds and snow and ice, cold like the first nights of winter. That didn't work, either; it only made the room feel even colder as the Gengar phased out of the attack, reappearing by the scaled monster. The ghost darted out its tongue in a long, playful lick along the side of the monster's face, causing her to shudder and wince and snarl.

And then the ghost flew back to the other end of the room, balancing on the mane of the solemn Arcanine statue. 

"Why don't you try Earthquake? It could send us all down to the next floor. It would be a fun right, and it might even have a better view."

"Use Fire Blast."

"Come on, Nidoqueen. You want to use Earthquake, don't you? Go on, try it."

"Do not listen to that child, Nidoqueen-"

"Go on, then. Try Earthquake."

"Someone, please, just _kill_ me-!"

"Stop this insanity, _now!_ "

"Fire Blast!"

"Psychic!"

The scaled monster threw its head back and tried to build up a fire, but crouched down, shivering – perhaps from the lick it had received earlier. That let the ghost grin and let loose with a wild wave of energy, a wave that sent its enemy convulsing and roaring with sharp pain.

"Then, Night Shade."

Then a deep black haze engulfed the weakened Nidoqueen, consuming all the light surrounding it. When it had faded, it had been sent into a deep, unconscious coma. The boss stared on with an unreadable expression as the ghost hopped back and forth on each foot, in some twisted little victory dance.

It was so easy for everything to break apart. So easy. Easier than he would ever have guessed.

"Go, Kangaskahn."

The mother monster came rumbling out, stoically but skeptically, cautiously padding forward on the uneasy surface. Her child popped its head out of her pouch for a second, before she patted it back inside.

"You're even sending mothers and babies to fight me? You really are a desperate bunch."

But the fact was there - a ghost would not be that strong against a foe like this. The boss knew this well enough.

"Rock Slide."

The Kangaskahn slammed her fist against the ceiling several times, smashed it until chunks of it fell and crashed around the ghost. Most of the debris served to widen the gulf in the floor, causing enough of a lurch to send the statue flying down, throwing the Gengar off balance.

"Quickly, Fire Blast!"

Just as the ghost landed on some steady ground, a jet of fire tore out of the Kangaskahn's maw and licked around the ghost. When the attack died, the ghost flew through the flames with only an irritated grumble – no roar, no scream. Just irritation. It threw out another psychic blast, but the Kangaskahn wasn't as vulnerable to it as the Nidoqueen was - she retaliated with a sharp beam of ice that speared through the ghost, pinning it to the wall. 

Gengar was not at all happy about this, even while dematerializing its body around and out of the spear. It molded back together with a toothy frown.

"Well, that won't work, then. What's your plan, Gengar? You always have a few tricks up your sleeve."

Hearing that, the ghost broke out into another grin, another giggle – but this one was different. This one was a low, death-rattle laugh, one that chimed and shuddered through the air and sent the president into a paralyzed state of sudden panic.

"Have fun with that, then."

The ghost nodded and made an even wider, even more gleeful grin, then bounced off the walls, on the roof, on the floor, on the walls again, back to the fallen statue, on the very tip of a pile of debris, back to the walls—

"You truly are a child," the boss murmured. "Your pokémon seem to like taking after that."

"Or maybe I'm taking more after them. Who knows? Who knows."

The Kangaskahn tried tracking down the ghost that flung around the room, but to no avail. He couldn't, either - he wondered if anyone in the room could. At one moment, the grin would appear in that corner; the next, those red eyes would be over there. Then there would be a chill around his area, and then it would subside as quickly as it came.

Then, it happened, it all happened so fast. The Gengar appeared and wrapped its hands around the Kangaskahn's eyes, snickering. Then there came that light, that horrible light of death that blazed out of those deep red eyes—

Then there was that blast, that explosion of blinding light and deafening sound, one that even silenced out the secretary's agonized screams. When the inferno died down, the Kangaskahn had collapsed on her side, the Gengar fluttering down beside her, unconscious.

"Well, there you go. That's one of your tricks." Both trainers summoned back their fallen pokémon. 

"You were always one for crazy exits, weren't you, Gengar?" the child murmured to the pokéball. Then, to the other trainer: "Still have two more to go? Let's make this easy, Kabutops."

The boss said nothing, sending out his Rhydon in a burst of light. The fossil monster came out soon after, delicately standing off to the side of the jagged crack in the floor.

The boss reacted faster. "Rhydon, Body Slam!"

The Rhydon's bellow sounded like the roar of an explosion, its charge resembled that of a speeding train. And it landed with the force of both, even as the Kabutops skittered off towards the edge of the chasm. The ensuing blast sent most of the floor crashing down below, sending the two monsters down with it. The sprinkler system abruptly went off, spraying the area below with cold, cold water.

From below, there was only a pained, piteous howl. The child leaned forward to look down with a curious frown.

"Oh, there you are, Kabutops. Give him a good Hydro Pump, for good measure."

There were more tremors, presumably because the Rhydon was thrashing about, trying to strike - but they subsided with a loud blast, a loud burst of water.

"Okay. Time for you to come back." The child held the pokéball over the abyss, retreating the weakened pokémon - after that fall, it probably wouldn't be able to fight.

The boss looked at the child, some blazing emotion in his eyes; the child looked at the boss with only a small smirk. He couldn't place just what it was they were both feeling.

They both terrified him so much.

There came a flash as a towering Nidoking surged out, filling up the only remaining space it could fit - the one next to the child.

"You're – you're going to _attack-!_ "

"I promised you. I could not guarantee your safety and survival if you stood in our way again."

"Do you remember the executive? Your beloved, loyal little executive? Do you know what happened to him?"

"You will not be pardoned."

"He was here, guarding the door – making sure no one could break in. But do you know what happened as soon as I showed up? Seriously, he barely put up a fight. He even followed my advice, too – he trained up a Cubone. He had a little Marowak with him. I don't know if he was just desperate or if he was trying to guilt-trip me or something."

"I will not spare you."

"Once we trounced him, do you know what he did? That loyal, honorable, obedient guy? He made this little sound that I would never have expected from him – like, _don't, please, don't!_ And then he just stepped aside. He gave up. He gave up on you. He took one look at me, and then he ran. He just ran out of there." The child looked at the boss, smiled. "He ran. Will you run, too?"

"I will not run!"

"Not even from me?"

"You are _nothing._ You are a _child._ Nidoking—!"

He was about to call out something and the president was too, but there came a low, distant cry from far away that interrupted them. And then there was a sharp shout, a scream.

And then everything - the walls, the long row of windows, the world around them, even - everything shattered.

A dragon came bursting in, its wings sending the glittering glass hurtling through the air, its claws clutching the metal girders, its dark eyes glowering, its throat rippling as an erupting bellow rolled out of its jaws.

"Charizard, let's do it like the president said. Let's take this fight somewhere else."

The dragon howled and tore into the room, throwing everyone aside as it tackled the Nidoking. They both hurtled through the walls, sending them collapsing as the dragon tossed down the horned monster, grappling with it, setting its armor ablaze with white-hot fire.

"Face it - you're completely hopeless. You don't have power at all."

"We had this place. I had power!"

"Team Rocket's going to be finished."

_"Team Rocket will not fall!"_

"Then you really are in some stupid dream."

The secretary clung onto the president, burying her face against his shoulder, her hands death-white. And he could only stare as the dragon brutalized the Nidoking, smashing it into the floor with a building rage; the Nidoking would try to reach up, to snap out a quick attack, but it would be sent back down with a stream of fire in the face. He didn't want to watch this – but it was the only thing he could see.

"We're done, Charizard."

Then, all too suddenly, it was finished. The Charizard became stoic, silent as it dropped the monster, and crawled back over to the child. The boss, still numb from the fight, still numb from the loss, held up his pokéball and unconsciously called back his pokémon.

"Blast it," was all he could say at first. "Goddamn."

The child scratched at the Charizard's chin and grinned.

"We will never fall. We will never fall. This world only exists for us! All the pokémon - all the people - you only exist for me! You may have ruined my plans here; you may have defeated me once - but I will return. I must go, but I shall return!"

"All the more fun for me, then. Don't you think so, Charizard...?"

The boss turned and stared out the window, felt the wind against his face. Then he turned and turned again, and stormed out, shoving the child aside as the Charizard snarled in his face. But he left. He was gone.

He was gone.

It was over.

"Oh, that was fun. Kind of got a bit messy, though."

The president nodded, his body starting to shake. "You saved us. You...you stopped Team Rocket. You saved us." The child looked at him, dead in the eyes, and he shrunk back. "Th-thank you for saving Silph."

"Don't hurt me," the secretary squeaked against his ear, barely audible.

"You can't say that," he murmured to her. He looked over to the child again. "I will...I will never forget that you saved us in our moment of peril!"

The secretary slowly pulled up, and nodded, her eyes red, his face pale. "Thank you for rescuing all of us."

"It wasn't anything at all, really." The child looked at them with a tilted head, a tilted smile. "I enjoyed it. It was quite a walk, here. And the view's really nice. Have you ever tried taking a look out there?"

"I have. It...it is nice."

The sun was setting out there, sending a deep red light into the room, on the child's face. Everything was broken, everything was shattered, but the tiny shards of glass glowed with a light that was almost beautiful.

Broken, beautiful.

"I think it's about time we fly, don't you think, Charizard? We'll have to finish this up later."

"Wait! Don't leave; you can't leave. Someone might come back, and...and y-you can't let him have it!"

The child paused, eyebrows raised, lips parted. "Have what?"

"The...the Master Ball," he blurted. "The pokéball that can master any pokémon."

"Ah. Wasn't that his latest project?"

He nodded. "I...I felt as though he was going to use it for something horrible, and I did not want him to use it. It...it can catch even the most unstoppable pokémon. It can catch anything."

"Anything?"

"Anything."

The child looked at him thoughtfully, and then slipped into a slow, soft smile.

"Why, I'll take it, then."


	14. the hospital

It was nice to listen to the trainers calling their mothers, she thought.

Over the humming of the machines and her flipping the magazine pages, she could hear the trainer talking quietly: “Yeah, yeah, I get it. But we’re almost done hear. You know that? Yeah, it didn’t take much. No, not much. Now, what do you think about that?”

She glanced over to the screens, where she could see the pokémon in their soft stasis, slowly recovering. There were only three, and an odd bunch, too, but considering they had gotten the trainer this far…

The trainer hung up the phone on the wall, stretched out, and then walked over to the couches, thinking about something.

“You must be a good trainer,” she decided to say.

“Yeah?”

“You only have three, and you’re doing well on the gym challenge. That takes talent!”

“It might, maybe. The pokémon and I – we get along.” Rather than heading to the couches, the trainer approached the counter instead. At that distance, the nurse suddenly realized just who it was she was speaking to.

“Oh! I didn’t realize – I’m sorry. You…you were the one who stopped Team Rocket at Saffron City, weren’t you?”

“Hm?” The trainer then nodded in response, making a half-smile. “Yeah. Yeah, I was.”

“Thank you,” she said, feeling helplessly warm now. “My sister works there, and she couldn’t stand them. She and I – my whole family, in fact – we’re all very grateful. I’m sure all of Saffron, and Kanto, too, thanks you. I just, I…thank you.”

“That’s all right. At some point or another, you can’t help but just think that they need to get roughed up a little. Team Rocket, I mean.”

“I’m sure many people thought that, but no one could do anything about it. And now there are reports that Team Rocket is falling apart. It’s…it’s amazing, really. After all that, after having to see the Rockets slowly spreading across the country…” She shook her head. “We don’t have to worry about that now. It’s…liberating.”

“I liked stopping them. That’s all I needed.” The trainer tapped out a rhythm on the counters. 

The nurse’s eyes drifted back to the screens, idly glancing over the vital signs. Then the trainer spoke again:

“Do you get many trainers here?”

“Hm? Oh, no. A long time ago, we used to get many trainers passing through here when the gym was active – almost no one could beat the leader, so everyone always had to come here to heal up. Now, these days…sometimes we get some new trainers from Pallet Town, but not too many. Otherwise, we only get a few trainers who try crossing Victory Road.” Her words drifted off as she looked down at the blank white floors. “Honestly, you’re one of the few that have come recently. It gets a little lonely sometimes, being here alone. But don’t tell my sisters that – I don’t want them worrying.”

The trainer nodded, then glanced over at the nurse’s magazine – it was about cooking, which probably wouldn’t interest the trainer for long.

“So, are you going to challenge the gym here? It’s been closed for the longest time, but it’s just recently reopened.”

“That’s my plan. It’s something I have to do, at least.”

“Will it be your eighth badge?”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Then you’ll be able to challenge the League!”

“I might as well. It’ll be fun.”

“Hopefully,” she said, looking back to her magazine. “Hey – if you win, I can try cooking you something. Something you like. We can celebrate, and it’ll be my way of thanking you. Maybe I can round up my sisters to help, too!”

“But what if I lose?”

“Then it’ll be to mourn your defeat.”

The trainer chuckled lightly, a small smile quirking up. “Hm, maybe I’ll take you up on that.” Eyes moved to lock on hers. “Yeah, maybe.”

That was something about this trainer – the eyes. They were so dark.

That was something about the pokémon, too. Dark eyes, all of them.

They all had those oddly dark eyes.

Was it love that made them look so much like each other? Was it a coincidence, a trick of the light that made them all the same? She wasn’t sure at all.

It felt oddly sterile in here, all of a sudden. The nurse didn’t feel like cooking anymore.

“It looks like they’ve finished healing,” she said, still keeping her head up. “That would mean it’s time for you to fight the gym leader, isn’t it? One more badge to go!”

“One more badge to go. Then it’ll be over.” As she handed over the tray of pokéballs, all of them scratched and scuffed and chipped and cracked, the trainer looked to them. “What do you think about that, everyone? We’re about to settle this.”

“Be careful when you go out,” she said. “There’s a thunderstorm on the horizon. It may get a little dangerous out there.”

“Another one? Well, that’s something.” One by one the trainer inspected each of the pokéballs. 

She remembered each of them and the pokémon that was held inside – the Charizard’s was the one that was most mutilated; the dragon itself seemed to be the weariest one of all of them, even though it was still very, very young. 

The Gengar’s one had this odd chill to it every time the nurse had touched it, and she wondered if the ghost had something to do with it, if the ghost sniggered and giggled every time she had brushed her fingers against it. 

The Kabutops had the newest model, but the monster held inside was so old, so ancient, and in such a new century, a new millennium – surely, just by looking at it, she felt that maybe it was more lost than alive.

Weary, cold, more lost than alive…

And they all had the same eyes.

Dark eyes.

“We haven’t had rain in a long time,” she thought out loud. “It’ll be good for us to have some, even if it’s during a storm.”

The trainer with dark eyes looked out the window. “I used to like playing out in it when I was younger. Charizard doesn’t, though. I know a lot of people who don’t like staying out in it, too.”

“It gets kind of cold,” she murmured.

“But it feels nice. That’s what I think, at least.”

The nurse looked down at her hands.

“Anyway,” the soft voice said, “It’s about time I go challenge the gym, isn’t it? I’d like to get it down before the rain comes.” With that, the trainer turned around, and made over to the doors, which slid open with a slick hiss.

In the calm before the storm, she looked after the trainer, hesitated, then managed a quiet murmur, a forgotten farewell.

“We… We hope to see you again.”

But she wasn't sure if that was true. She wasn't sure at all. Perhaps it would be good for the trainer to come back; perhaps it was all just in her imagination. Or maybe she shouldn't have ever spoken to that trainer at all.

One thing was certain, though.

There was going to be a terrible thunderstorm tonight.


	15. the end

There was a soft hiss, a soft crackle of energy as they were called back. When the soft, pale red lights had faded, there was nothing left – then there was a deep hush. A deep hush fell over everything.

“It’s over.”

He shook his head.

“It’s _over._ ”

The child approached him in the dim light.

“You’re done. It’s all done.”

“This is _impossible._ ”

“Can I have my badge, now?”

“This...this cannot be really…”

“Oh, hush. I thought you were supposed to be the honorable gym leader now. That’s why you came back again, right? Get a fresh start or something?”

“I didn’t come back for this,” he said. “This wasn’t…”

“It’s finished.”

He looked down at the child, at the eerily serene smile – at that smile he hadn’t seen for such a long time. And he knew those words were true.

It was over.

He reached into the pocket of his coat, pulled out the single, glistening emerald badge – deep green roses, almost. He held the tiny, delicate jewel between his fingers, and gently tossed it over to the child, to the challenger.

An effortless catch.

“That settles that, then.”

He cast his eyes down to the floor. “There was another challenger here – an arrogant boy, as I recall. I believe I saw him once before, but when he arrived to challenge me, he seemed to have no idea who I was.”

“Wasn’t that what you wanted?”

Everything felt calm, despite that battle, despite how desperately he had called out his commands, despite that storm that had rolled through his heart. Everything was still, now. He couldn’t feel anything.

“…I did not accept his challenge. I simply gave him the badge. You were the only one I could battle, in the end.”

“And you did battle me, didn’t you?”

He couldn’t feel anything at all. Emptiness, maybe. “I battled you. And I lost.” He couldn’t find any more words.

The child nodded, looking to the small, fragile badge. “In the end, you lost, and I won. That’s all that can be said, really.”

It had been too long since he had been here last. He had forgotten about the lights in the gym, about how dim they were, how they cast a gentle light across the harsh earth terrain. A pale, gentle light, no matter how intense the battle had gotten, no matter how much madness was put into that fight.

“Your badge looks really nice, actually. I’ve never seen anything quite like it before.”

“I created it.”

“You did? It’s a small, fragile thing. I wouldn’t have expected that from you.”

“It was when I ran the gym here, a long time ago. The one I gave you – that was the last one I ever made.”

“Before you founded Team Rocket?”

He nodded.

“I see.”

He looked to the child.

“It’s over, now. Team Rocket is finished. Having lost, I…I cannot face them now. It’s finished. Forever.”

“Forever?” The child looked to the ceiling, to the light. “They probably won’t like that. Some of them are lost. Some of them need someone to follow. Some of them need someone to be their leader.”

“I cannot do that anymore.”

“You don’t have enough power?”

“Not anymore.”

“It doesn’t take power, really. Just a nice smile. Just a few words.”

The child looked at him with that smile, that serene smile, that serene smile from that time. Just by looking, it seemed as though nothing had changed with the child, that nothing had changed with him, that nothing had changed between the two of them. And yet it had. Everything had changed, completely.

“What is it that you want?”

“Hm?”

“Why did you come with us in the first place? And why did you leave?”

“I don’t know. I wanted to.”

“That’s not an answer,” he breathed. “You always know more than you say.” He looked at those eyes, those haunting eyes, that haunting smile. Those eyes and that smile would always be there in his mind. Even now, he knew one thing – he knew that this child would wander around in his thoughts forever.

He almost felt something, at that thought.

“What did you want? What did you want to do?”

“I don’t know, now. That was a while ago. I guess I thought you knew what life was all about. But you didn’t. Maybe that’s why I came with you.”

A moment of silence, a moment of light.

“Is that why you did this?” He slipped a hand in his pocket, found the lighter, found the cigarette. “Were you trying to teach me some sort of lesson? To teach me something that only you could teach…?”

“I wanted to have fun. And I had fun. That was all that mattered.”

“…I see.”

“I doubt you do. You were never one for fun. You never thought about it once, not even when you made the casino. Like I said before – you should have taken a swing at the slots once or twice. It might have changed your world.”

He smirked. “I was never one for games of chance.”

“I like them both – slots and chess. Luck and strategy. That might be how life works – sometimes it takes a bit of luck, sometimes it takes some thought. It’s better that way. It gets kind of boring if you’re stuck with one for too long.”

“And that’s why you left, wasn’t it? As you said – you found life too boring. Too tiring.”

“I was bored _and_ I was tired. They’re not the same thing. But most people can’t tell the difference, anyway. But when you can, and when you feel them both at the same time, it’s the worst feeling in the world.” 

Having put the badge away, the child began to softly pass a pokéball back and forth, between both hands. “So I thought trying to topple you guys would be fun. And it was. In part because I knew that I could win, too. Face it – you guys were pretty much a pack of morons.”

“And how, exactly, were we morons…?”

“Why, you don’t even have to ask.”

He struck the lighter and breathed. Soft clouds of smoke billowed through the air, turned into dust in the light.

“It was never out of my hands,” he said after that pause, after that silence. “Everything could have been mine. I had Kanto. I could have had the world in my hands. And yet…I simply forgot what I was looking for.” He paused. “That’s why I came here, at first. Back to where it all began. To rebuild. To gather my thoughts. To understand myself, to harness my power. But then, you came. As you did before. As you always do, even now.”

“Do you get it now?” The child stopped playing with the pokéball. “Do you remember what I told you back at the casino? You’re not the nameless master of the world. You’re just like everyone else. You’re just some guy who can’t help but get a little scared when the night comes. You’re just someone who’s waiting for the rain to stop falling.” 

“I was different from everyone else. I was stronger than all of them. I had power.”

“No. You didn’t have anything. You never had anything. I don’t have anything, either. I prefer it that way, actually.” The child mused for a pause. “You might, too. You should try it sometime. What else are you going to do?”

He made a brief, resigned smile. “I don’t know what else there is left.”

The child inspected the pokéball in the light. “You know, you could always go off and study pokémon, you know. The old guy back at the village I lived in seemed to love that. He didn’t have anything else – he couldn’t even remember anyone’s name – but he was enthralled with them. He had an another life when he was studying them.” 

The pokéball was tucked back in a pocket. “Besides, I’m just like them, aren’t I? That’s what you said – I’m just like a pokémon. You could take a look at them, get to know them a little. And then maybe you’d get why I beat you.”

The child stood there, silent, thoughtless, still, then picked up the bag on the floor, slung it on, and began heading towards the gym doors. “Well, that’s about it, really. I’m going, now.”

“And what will you do after this?”

The child paused for a second, for a minute, then turned around. “After this, I’m going to challenge the League. I think there’s someone there who’s waiting for me, who’s waiting to challenge me. You can pound his face in the dirt all you like, and he’ll keep getting up every time. He’ll still think he can beat you, no matter how badly he’s thrashed. He’ll still think he’s the one you wanted to fight all along. He’s completely desperate. It’s almost sad to watch.”

He rolled the cigarette between his lips, stared back at the child’s dark eyes. “Then what are you going to do?”

The child leaned back and sighed, tilting up to look at the lights, then drawing those dark, those bored, those _exhausted_ eyes to his face. “Then what am I going to do? What do you think I’ll do? What do you think I got the Master Ball for? The pokéball that can master any pokémon?”

For a moment, silence settled across the room.

“Why, I’m going to go after it, of course. It’s lost. And I’m going to find it. And then I’m going to tell it what I think life is all about. Then – who knows? Maybe we’ll be friends.”

He stiffened. “You won’t be able to do that. You can’t do that. It’s…that’s impossible.” He shook his head. “It won’t obey you. It won’t obey anyone. You know that.”

“I remember that - that’s what the old guy said. But he was wrong about a lot of things, wasn’t he? Still, I think everything works out in the end. It really does.”

“…It’s not possible. It’s not possible.”

“I’ll see for myself.” The kid stood straight again. And there came that grin again: that insufferable little grin. That whirling grin, the one that looked too much like that of a ghost’s. “Then I’ll see you again. We’ll be like old friends, won’t we?” A nod. “We’ll see each other again someday. It’ll be fun. You’ll see.”

And that was all. And that was all it took. The child swung the doors open, swung them out into the night, and left. The doors slammed shut, and the sound echoed through the gym – though it may have been the thunder. The thunder that made the sky shudder, that made people shudder, that made him shudder, that made…

He remembered them all; he knew them by heart. He remembered the stories of the child and the monster, murmured to him by the old caretaker, whispered among the scientists and peons. How, between them, there had been that union – that union that held them together so tightly that it could have brought them both down together, and the world down with them.

The world shuddered for a moment, then fell still.

There was something there, now – something in that emptiness. He felt something.

He felt afraid.

For the first time in so many years, he felt afraid.

For the first time in so many years, he wanted to run away.

He could no longer lead the world. He could no longer make the world stop shuddering at the sound of thunder, at the approach of night. He had to leave, now. He had to run. He had to leave everything behind. He had to let this dream collapse, he had to kill it, bury it, forget he had ever even dreamt it. There were many things he needed to do.

But, in that moment, as the lights flickered into darkness and the thunderclap sounded again, there was only one thing he could do. There was only one thing he needed to do now.

He closed his eyes, and waited for the rain to stop.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this some time ago for a prompt on the pokanon meme - based on a quote from a Team Rocket NPC in Silph: "You dare betray Team Rocket?" There were some other requests tagged to the prompt, such as the protagonist having an undefined gender and not being the child of Giovanni. It made for an interesting piece to write, and I hope it was just as interesting for you to read.
> 
> Thanks.


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